21 vegetarian friendly restaurants in Manchester

The much loved Caribbean cafe ARMR Store has relocated from Ardwick to take over the bar and kitchen at Contact Theatre on Oxford Road.

The seeds of Matthew Nutter’s fine dining adventure were sown when he set out to “make veg taste better than steak”. And the menu at The Allotment Vegan Eatery exceeds this ambition.

Bundobust is a huge beer hall serving craft ales in the heart of Manchester’s Piccadilly Gardens. It also happened to win Restaurant of the Year at the 2017 Manchester Food and Drink Festival awards, thanks to its stellar menu of Indian small plates.

The ‘Burbs is exactly the sort of informal neighbourhood spot you want round the corner from your house.

Dishoom is a legend in its own lunchtime and that’s exactly how it likes things. It’s not enough to serve up top-notch Indian dishes in grand surroundings; there’s a story behind the menu too. But when the food is this good it doesn’t need to hide behind tall tales.

And the food is this good.

The menu is bursting with small plates arriving at the table as and when, plus biriyani, curry and grilled gubbins as well as all sorts of sides and sundries. If you’re part of a big group (or obscenely greedy) it’s possible and even preferable to order something from each section.

Fresh from the roaring success of its first venue down at Hatch on Oxford Road in Manchester, Herbivorous opened its first self-made restaurant in Withington in October 2021. Co-founders Robyn and Damien have been cooking together since they first started dating so the passion for the food they create runs deep.

Known to its friends as ITR, the second of the three bright Indian Tiffin Room restaurants specialises in thalis (a kind of mini buffet) and south Indian tiffin dishes, putting colour on a plate with its street food inspired by the bustling stalls of different parts of India.

Inspire Cafe is an inclusive, relaxed gem of a community cafe housed in a former church in Levenshulme. It serves breakfasts, light lunches, and homemade cake during the day, with occasional pop-ups from local street food traders (with local beers) in the evening.

Many of us are familiar with the vibrant cuisines of Vietnam and Thailand but Cambodian, or Khmer, food is still relatively unexplored territory in the UK. Kambuja in Marple is one of the country’s few dedicated Cambodian restaurants – and it’s a good one. It received rave reviews in the national press when it opened in 2017 under its former name of Angkor Soul.

Lily’s Indian Vegetarian Cuisine is an unassuming restaurant in Ashton-under-Lyne that happens to serve some of the best South Indian food in the UK.

The Little Yeti is one of the newest dining spots on Barlow Moor Rd, but from the well-oiled team behind Didsbury veterans Gurkha Grill. It’s an establishment of the ‘limited menu but executed very well’ variety, which is more common in Asia than over here, where ‘all things to all people’ is perhaps too often attempted.

Mumbai to London Cafe doesn’t look like much from the outside (or the inside) but don’t let that fool you; there is some fantastic food to be found in this lowkey, licensed restaurant and takeaway in Droylsden.

The group of friends behind The Pasta Factory’s story originally hail from Turin in the northern region of Piedmont, so this is the place for authentic Italian food full of flavour, with dishes created from scratch using only the best fresh ingredients in season.

Sitting in the old Dough Kitchen spot in the Northern Quarter, Purezza is yet another pizza restaurant for Manchester – but one with the distinction of offering solely vegan pizza and a menu that has many gluten-free items.

Everyone’s heard of NQ backstreet gaff This & That, even if they’ve not actually found it (it’s up the ginnel by Trof’s empty barrels) – renowned for its daily changing “rice and three” meal deal and winning vegan and vegetarian choices, it’s been an institution since 1984.

Salford independent the Treehouse Cafe is the sort of picture-perfect coffee house you frequently see on Instagram but rarely stumble upon on the streets of Broughton. 

Trove Levenshulme has been going strong since 2011. The main draw is its fantastic bread, which forms the basis for its breakfast menu.

Local hit Vegan Shack started life in owner Dimeji Sadiq’s one bedroom Salford flat where he used to cook up plant-based versions of fast food for himself and his girlfriend.

Ancoats is fast becoming the go-to place in Manchester to get your authentic Vietnamese food fix, with various purveyors of pho, traditional coffee and other specialities of Vietnam – but popular Vnam is one of the pioneers, having set up shop on Oldham Street back in 2010.

Lebanese and Syrian restaurant Yara is not alone with its Cheadle outpost – equally popular branches can be sniffed out in Alderley Edge, Altrincham and Whitefield. Renowned for dishing up huge portions, there’s also now an order online option for finger-licking Middle Eastern fayre to your door.

TV chef Simon Rimmer’s famous non-meatery Greens has been going strong in Didsbury since 1990. In summer 2022, he branched out to Sale’s new social and dining destination Stanley Square, offering innovative and locally sourced vegetarian and vegan food, plus a rooftop bar and outside spaces.

Zouk specialises in ‘apna’ – home-style cooking shot through with colour and heat from the spices and herbs. In recent years it has incorporated elements of global street food to its menu (Lahori wagyu sliders for example) but the main focus is still the authentic Indian and Pakistani cooking that made Zouk a success.